Antique, Classic or a Passing Fad

One of my favorite shows on TV is “Antiques Road Show.” The items discussed are usually at least 100 years old or even centuries old. I often wonder how many people have handled the article, like a vase, over those centuries.

To be an antique an item must be at least 100 years old. If it’s at least 50 years old but less than 100, it’s called “Classic.”

A fad on the other hand is only a passing fancy, something that generation of teenagers holds dear. It may not be an item at all, but simply an idea, a form of music, a special dance.

 I came across an article from an unusual site called howstuffworks.com. Why they included “Fads of the 50s” I don’t know, but I found their top ten list of those fads to be lacking in many of the items and things I remember from that time in my life—when I was a teenager. I see gaping holes in their analogy which I’ll try to fill in here to the best of my ability. I’m sure you can think of many more hole fillers yourself if you are of the same age as I. Here goes.

Number Ten: The poodle skirt. Every teenage girl my age had one. Mine was grey I think with a pink poodle. They were usually made of felt and appliquéd with a poodle, thus the name. They may also have had other appliqués like 45 rpm records, dice, hot rods, or musical notes. Usually worn with a petticoat, and coming in just below the knee and worn with bobby socks and either penny loafers, white bucks, or saddle shoes, we would swish our way down the old Rockland High School corridors with pride.

What’s missing: The aforementioned petticoats. Every teenage girl had at least three or four. When one got limp, we’d just add another new one on top. Sometimes we’d end up with about four under our skirts at any given time. I remember a classmate, Joan Knowlton, who on our Senior Washington D.C. trip had to struggle to pack all her petticoats when we were leaving.

As for the boys, the 50s was the beginning of the Tee-Shirt. At this point they were simply white and worn without another shirt on top. Boys also rolled up the pant legs of their jeans or dungarees as we called them. They might also roll a pack of cigarettes in the sleeve of their tee, or sometimes they’d carry a ciggie behind one ear. If they had a leather jacket to go with all this, they were something special, a real greaser. By the way, the word “greaser” was a word made up later to describe them. We never used that word in the 50s.

Number Nine: The Sock Hop, so named because we had to take our shoes off to protect the gym floor where the dance was held. These dances were chaperoned and the music in our case came from someone spinning our favorite records of the day (45s, by the way.) The 50s was the beginning of the TV show “American Bandstand” with Dick Clark out of Philadelphia.

The people of my era in the 50s are very proud of the fact that they were there at the birth of Rock ‘N’ Roll, certainly not a passing fad.

Number Eight: 50s dances. The dances we danced in those days were “The Stroll” and “The Jitterbug (which is called The Jive by those who lived in the big city, and also on today’s “Dancing With the Stars.” You might say that the dances are two different dances, but they certainly are similar. It gives me a chuckle that they include that dance in the “ballroom” category. We teens in the 50s would certainly have cringed at the very thought of that. Towards the end of the 50s and into the early 60s “The Twist” came into vogue. I did a mean twist. As far as ballroom goes, the closest we got to that was what we called “a slow dance.” This dance was usually done in a “box step” or simply moving our feet in one spot while snuggling with our partner. Many a chaperone split these couples apart. The dance usually ended the night for the sock hop.

Number Seven: 3-D movies. The genre lent itself to horror and fantasy movies the best. Remember Vincent Price in “House of Wax?” Also “Bwana Devil” in 1952; “It Came From Outer Space,” in 1953; and “The Creature From the Black Lagoon.” I must admit I was too much of a scaredy cat to attend these movies. I’ve never seen a 3-D movie.

Number 6: The conical bra. For the life of me I can’t see why this was such an important fad if it really was one. Seems to me it still exists today. I would have put the above petticoats here. Hollywood movie stars like Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield and Jane Russell wore them and they were so-called because they “lifted and separated” in a conical shape. It was also called a “torpedo bra” or a “bullet bra.” The legend goes that Howard Hughes engineered the bra to enhance Russell’s profile in “The Outlaw.”

Number 5: Beatniks. Being isolated as we were in Maine, beatniks didn’t live among us. We knew they existed of course, but the word “beatniks” was almost a dirty word to us. I really didn’t discover any of their writings until later on as a young adult. They certainly did leave an impression on American arts and literature. The most famous works are: “On the Road,” by Jack Kerouac, 1957; “Howl,” by Allen Ginsberg, 1956; and “Naked Lunch,” by William S. Burroughs.

I did read “Howl” at some point, probably because it was one of those books that were “banned in Boston” and I didn’t go along with the idea that a church or government official can tell me what to read and what not to read.

The Beatniks are often credited with helping along the “Flower Power” or “drug” generation that followed in the 60s. I believe they belong in this list, albeit as Number 5.

Number Four: Drive-in Theaters. These theatres certainly belong in this list. As the car craze revved up the teenagers of the day, the drive-in was the next logical step. They disappeared as bigger and better indoor theaters came about. There are about 500 left in the country. Remember what the guys used to do with the door speakers? Not telling…but.

What’s Missing: Somewhere in here I think they should have at least mentioned some of the classic cars of the day. I’m not much on cars, but you guys could certainly rattle off the most popular cars of the day. Of course, we on the coast of Maine, could mainly just dream of owning one of these cars.

Number Three: Gelatin molds. Really? If I put this anywhere in the list it would be at about 20^th place.

Number Two: Davy Crockett coonskin hats. Again…really? While I admit the popularity of this hat due to the TV show, I don’t think I’d give it such a high place on this list. Then again I’m a girl and the hat wouldn’t have interested me anyway.

Number One: Soda Fountains. Now this I’ll agree with. When the last soda fountain, Goodnows, left Main Street it was a sad day for me. How many hours did we spend in one of these soda fountains? Some in the bigger cities had juke boxes such as the one in “Happy Days.” They faded along with the Drive-ins when fast food places came along. Before “home refrigeration” this was the only place to get a cold drink and ice cream.

The “soda jerk,” so-called because of the motion of operating the fountain taps, gave us some unique creations including sodas, egg creams and milkshakes or what we called in Maine “ice cream sodas.” Many were made with store-made syrups making them unique.

So there you have it. What would you subtract from this list and what would you add in its place? How many of these classic things do you think will survive in the history books to come? How many of them will become antiques or at least collectibles? We’ll just have to wait and see.

Thanks for listening.